mikeynz

When the better horses stopped racing the slow slide downhill started,more average meetings,and no major meetings,what the future is in the region is anybody's guess. Harness racing is running a lot of average meetings,Rangiora racing for 7000 stakes 2 Sundays recently,and a diet of same old same old,sometimes quantity needs to be replaced with quality,yet the TAB and the harness leaders claim things are going well,are they really? Interesting you hear the chat about poor crowds for the super rugby games on at present,well can anybody work out why?

With the heavy rain in Canterbury will be interesting to see how some of the tracks fare.

Judging by some of the ideas by hrnz about this time last year it would be of concern. Would have been hard shifting Forbury to Wyndham coz it would have been gone too.

I guess if they did move to Wingatui and did have a AWT you would think that Sunday meetings would be order of the day,initially Sunday racing was for country clubs, I think Wingatui would be classed in that category,for some strange reason running Sunday meetings at Addington seems to be the norm now ,they have their time in the limelights on Fridays,leave the Sundays for others. Just to add,Alexy runs in the last shortly,O'Connell drives the horse, what are the odds,he is a Forbury specialist but he usually spaces his win to about 35 races so maybe not,we will see.

I think you find when things ain't going well,everybody probably blames others,I wonder if they are looking at a synthetic track for gallops and harness,if Forbury do shift to Wingatui to race anymore than the odd meeting they would need an all weather,but it seems there is no guarantee t.hat the harness big shots will support anything. just watched that trot with rank outsiders coming in but I struggle to see how that horse with the long name was such a short favourite,it had no form.

Glad that I could be of some assistance😂

Jack Frost is racing in one of the later races so he hasn't frightened off many as there are 10 races which in today's climate ain't bad,stakes are better,just shows that lots target the better days,often the lesser days are skipped by some but they are all part of the setup too.

Too much of a average product,sorry below average,ive been here just over a year now and weve been over the issues many times but dont just put racing in the poor product,rugby is no different,super rugby is a non event,Kirwan questions the ABs playing under prepared island teams and he is probably right,its all about the dollar and extracting as much as you can,i think as we get older we reflect on better times of the past,but we have to keep changing so the experts say yet as i said before most changes made seem to be 2 steps forward,3 back. Just to add,wait till the next election,we will be fed another line of bullshit from the polys but fuck all forward progress will eventuate.

There were over 30 from Riverton at Riverton on Easter Saturday,about 25 from Wingatui at Wingatui on Boxing Day maybe the weather has seen one or two knock off but the numbers just ain't there no more

Andertons have 16 noms,10 at a quick glance from others,there are probably more trained at Washdyke,and possibly Riverton as well,

Good numbers but apart from the Andertons hardly any others from Wingatui,never noticed how few are trained there now.

Big screen tv,at home😄

Seems this new setup will be up and running soon,they have completed their midweek crew. Probably will have nrl and I see this organisation also has the rights to cricket in aussie which does attract a lot of interest so live commentary is probable. Hopefully if there is racing they can get it right,saturday arvos would be good as starting point, after all where things double up you can switch things on to a online platform,radio sport use to have a extra channel when more than one event was on at same time.

The strange irony of Riccarton having a fancy,racing or training track is it wont make a scrap of difference to the grass track which probably suffers from having 3 days beatng the crap out of it to start the season off I know nothing about racecourses but in my field I know grass suffers from being hammered in winter,some of these courses probably need a bit of TLC to help them stay in top condition so the awts probably have their place but spreading the work load through winter and spring would make a big difference,reducing some courses wont help.

As I said before,fixed odds is considerably greater when so many hot favourites are running so it's likely that the TAB are not making actual profit, if the big punters were only betting on the tote then those winners might not even return a dividend. As for the stakes to turnover,Westport did 1.8 or1.9 mill on Boxing Day but only pay modest stakes, clubs like Westport must be subsidising clubs like Auckland,they must be on a different payout or something. Dont ever get me wrong,some of those horses racing and winning are top shelf but a lot of the races are becoming predictable as the All Blacks playing Tonga and Fiji, you kind of know what's going to happen before it's started.

That race at Auckland just run with those 2 top horses had a tote pool according to the website of 5500 which compares to the race run at Riverton last Thursday which had 5 starters and was for amateur riders and Auckland are racing at prime time, interesting.

I think we have discussed these issues before but I see mr flash was looking forward to a great nights racing,it's not great for betting as a rule and a lot of it is on a par with watching one tennis player. Harness racing has issues.

I see Devlins made the herald for being a dickhead,I'm not one to be a critic here of others,he is the exception,when he took over from telfer on radio sport that was it for me,other than live cricket and a wee bit if rugby I gave up on it,strange how it died a slow death.

Maybe it would make sense if Timaru get more Saturdays with the best horses to match the track they have and Riccarton less,it does look a better presentation with a good track.

Just looking at the calandar from the mid to ljate 90s, only now do you realise how much harness has changed,not for the better. Saturday night racing,regular racing in the cd which included Hawkes Bay,Nelson and Blenheim racing in spring,Hutt Park and Greymouth still going, grass racing in the north we don't often realise until we take a big step back to see how it's slowly descending,be nice to have a crystal ball to see what the landscape will be in 25 years.

In a year or twos time,maybe sooner the novelty will wear off.

Horses 4 courses,simple suits some,dont suit some others.

There ain't that many new innovations in racing these days,I watched the first 2 races and came to conclusion it's just another raceday,if I cant pick winners on grass what difference will it be on any other surface . Seriously though probably in a area like the Waikato it is a alternative for some and it's not affecting any other club,Riccarton on the other the taking of licences of one club in particular dont agree with that.

Second in interdom final twice. 2nd in the NZ cup,had a go at probably every big race around,so close yet so far.

Might be Forbury,he didn't seem to like the all stars for some reason,his post were a great piece of literature though,very amusing indeed.